Burundi was a German colony from 1885 to 1916.

After Burundi’s independence in 1962, Germany was one of the first partners to launch development cooperation with the country and enjoys a good reputation because of the successes achieved in Burundi’s development.

Following the years of international isolation between 2015 and 2020 in the wake of an attempted coup in 2015 and subsequent unrest, the country’s new President Évariste Ndayishimiye is taking a more open approach in terms of foreign policy. As a result, Burundi has relaunched political dialogue with the European Union and its member states.

The volume of trade between Burundi and Germany is very low. Burundi’s main export is coffee. In 2023, Germany exported goods worth 11.12 million US dollars to Burundi, a decrease of roughly 20.6 percent compared with the previous year.

Burundi is not a partner country of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development’s country programme. There is therefore no bilateral development cooperation between Germany and Burundi; the final projects are scheduled to end by mid-2026. These still ongoing projects focus especially on the key issues of water and sanitation, as well as health. Germany nevertheless supports Burundi in a variety of ways. It is, on the one hand, one of the largest donors of humanitarian assistance in the country. On the other, numerous regional and global programmes also take Burundi into account, for example in the areas of food security, agriculture and mining. Moreover, Germany is engaged in Burundi in the context of various Team Europe initiatives.

Land Baden-Württemberg cultivates a partnership with Burundi, which was formalised in 2014 with a joint declaration between the Land government and Burundi’s Minister of Foreign Affairs. A programme of events took place to mark its 40th anniversary in 2024. This partnership is primarily overseen by the state-owned Foundation for Development Cooperation – Baden-Württemberg (SEZ). A delegation from Land Baden-Württemberg attended the opening of the SEZ liaison office in Bujumbura in June 2023.

The German language classes offered at the University of Burundi and at a number of schools have met with great interest, with some 3500 students enrolling in them each year. In addition, the Goethe-Institut in Nairobi in cooperation with the German Embassy helps to promote German as a foreign language in Burundi.